So what does this do to the election dynamics? Does it turn off many democratic voters that weren't going to vote for Lamont anyway?Does it give the GOP an outside chance with the democrats split in two?Would the GOP be better off for 2008 with another 'Murtha' voice in the senate?

I don't know who the Republicans have running in Connecticut. However, if Lamont wins the Democratic primary, the Republicans should consider dropping out of the race, and backing Lieberman. THAT would be classy, and politically astute, since he is about as conservative as you are going to get out of that state.

Heaby Rhode Island offers up Lincoln Chaffee, a "Republican." I'd take Lieberman over Chaffee any day as a senator.

In the WaPo article, they say the GOP candidate's projected to pull maybe 8% of the vote. There's very little chance of a "spoiler" dynamic happening.

If JC had been clever enough to read the article instead of babbling incoherently, he'd have found out that there are more registered independents in Connecticut than registered Democrats.

I do, however, enjoy the genuinely insane idea that if the majority of the voters get the senator they want, then the "constituents" have somehow had their will frustrated.

If Lieberman runs as an independent and gets more votes than the Democrat — and from what the WaPo says, it's realistic — then he'd be recklessly handing the decision over to the voters of Connecticut, rather than leaving it safely in the hands of Democratic party hacks.

In that case, Lamont would certainly be right about Lieberman straying from his Democratic roots.

That's in addition to the way Lieberman has betrayed his Democratic roots by not being a multimillionare media mogul. The nerve of the man!

This, I believe, will all be academic after the primary election in August. Lieberman will win that race and the general election.

For Democrats to go after Lieberman for one issue is as silly as those Republicans who ignore John McCain's overwhelmingly conservative record, labeling him as a liberal because of his stance on campaign finance. (McCain has the third-most conservative voting record in the Senate.)

Both parties have their factions that would prefer shooting their own to actually winning elections or accomplishing anything politically. It doesn't make sense.

It's a fight for the soul of the Democratic party. The far left is stuck in the 60s with Hayden and the SDSers, endlessly revisitng those twin monoliths, Vietnam and Watergate, their finest hour.

That template doesn't work so well in the days of terrorism, but don't tell Kos. Is he zero for 20 now? Who cares, 'cause he's on a roll. Will Lieberman lose out? Who knows. The Dems might prefer Kos's lefty reactionaries to Truman-Kennedy Democrats. More's the pity.

Yeah, the polling is simple enough. There are two possible results from the August 8 primary, now that Lieberman has announced his willingness to run independently:

1) Lieberman wins the primary, is re-elected in November over the Republican.

2) Lieberman loses the primary, is re-elected in November over Lamont and the Republican.

So the question for the powerbrokers in the Democratic Party is how much they want to piss off a guy with a 77% liberal voting record (as measured by Americans for Democratic Action) who will be the senator from Connecticut for the next six years. The general answer seems to be "not very much", despite what the "netroots" say.

I guess I don't see what is so wrong with Lieberman working with Gore. Now, I hated the 200 Gore campaign, in large part because Ibroke my heart campaigning for Bill Bradley against Gore, and becuase Clinton seemed loathsome to me after all the high hopes I had for the DLC president in '92. But Gore, pre 1992, was a decent enough guy for a politician (if a bit of a prig) and walked a sort of center path, and come '92, well, we had worries. Lieberman seemed a nice pick to me -- a reminder that the "big tent" was alive and well. Made Gore much more electable, from where I stood.

Now, you don't have to buy that or like the ticket. But the upshot is, Gore was something of a chameleon in those days, and the Gore side I liked -- the pre-populist Gore -- had a lot of Lieberman in him. I appreciated the message the pick sent.

Lieberman has more class than almost all the rest of the nationally known Dems combined. I know there are others known on a more regional basis I'm sure, but they get no play in a Dean or McAuliffe DNC.

It would be best for the country, and Democrats in the long run, if Lieberman is re-elected. Better for the Dems to do it through the primary, but if he has to run as an independent post-primary to win, that'll suffice.

One of the early Kos commenters says "Well, I guess "united we stand, divided we fall" just doesn't mean what it used to." So, it was OK for the Kos mob to try and bury the guy in his re-election bid. But when he decides that he's had enough rejection and runs independent to he's disloyal. How DARE he even consider survival, when the mob needs demonstrate its political strength by crushing him utterly!

Moral? Friends like the Kos crowd make great enemies. They themselves have all the 'loyalty' of a pack of hyenas.

Snitch, it'd be fine if he left the party and just ran as an Independent, but he's trying to have two bites at the apple. Many states have laws preventing losers in primaries from petitioning to run in the general election, and presumably that's the intent behind CT's petition deadline of "the day after the primary".

There is little question that Lamont will beat Lieberman in the Democratic primary, and little question that Lieberman will win in November.

Perhaps the only rational reason to support Lieberman in the general election would be to deny Lowell Weicker his revenge for Lieberman defeating him in 1988. Weicker - they guy who brought Connecticut the state income tax in a slick move that represented an approximately 60% cut in his own taxes - has been a huge promoter of Lamont because he never forgets a slight, and this gives him a chance to get Lieberman and annoy the Bush family, with whom he does not have good releations, to boot.

Maybe I don't listen to enough political talk (and how much is enough, or too much? Now there's a topic worth debating) to know better. That noted, every time I've heard an interview with Sen. Lieberman, he's always come across as well-spoken, thoughtful, respectful, and someone willing to explain not the simple whats of any given belief he holds or policy he expounds, but the whys behind the belief or policy. I don't agree with everything he does, but to hear him makes me examine the whys behind what I believe on a given topic.

We could use a lot more civility and careful explanation in politics. I'd rather hear someone I disagree with using the aforementioned approach than someone I agree with doing their best impersonation of a screeching harpy.

LOL. Also "I'm a right-winger, and I voted for Bush, but boy has he ever let me down and messed up the country and ruined the world and stuff!"

Heck, I'll take that one, Buddy. I'm quite conservative and, honestly, would still vote for Bush over the choices provided in the past --- but it's nigh impossible to be a conservative and NOT have some serious problem with Bush on a couple of issues.

As for this, I'm thinking CFR is actually hurting the Dems a lot because their largest sources of funding ARE people who push them further and further away from electability.

For all of his faults, Kos is a major cog in the DNC now because he can bring in money. Hollywood is unbelievably important. The assorted billionaires who routinely give money are key.

None of these groups really do much to help the Democratic Party return to power.-=Mike